Originally published: Visions: Literary and Arts Magazine by Tina Mai (April 2022)
Written by Nadia Momtaz and Ashley Shanahan
Social media has created a paradoxical teenage mindset towards fashion in which we pride ourselves on “liking things before they were cool”, yet constantly feel pressured to keep up with the newest trends. Fashion brands take advantage of this desire to simultaneously fit in while avoiding being “basic”, producing a never-ending cycle of waste and frustration, making getting ready in the morning a living hell.
According to data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1.4 million tons of clothing and footwear waste was generated by Americans in 1960, skyrocketing to over 13 million tons in 2018. Clearly, this disposable attitude towards clothes is a new phenomenon, rooted in social media culture. Now more than ever, celebrities and influencers have wide access to the general public through new social media platforms. Just about anybody with a TikTok account can go viral promoting a new trend at any second. And fast-fashion brands are adept at getting production and distribution of their trendy products to match the pace of the latest craze. Fast-fashion companies aim to make their product as cheap as possible, sacrificing quality along the way. The low quality of material, design, and craftsmanship of the product allows for it to go from the drawing table to the market in a matter of days. Thus fast-fashion brands can introduce hundreds of new styles to the market each day, whereas they once only introduced new styles seasonally. All this simply means that trends rise and spread much faster than they used to; thus they inevitably must fall a lot faster too. Fast-fashion clothing becomes unwearable after a certain period of time, either from going out of style or from physically wearing away. And what does the average consumer do when their favorite trend is not so hot anymore? Get rid of the item. This creates an unbelievable amount of waste, and the data shows that most of that discarded clothing ends up in landfills, landfills that blight the landscape of our Earth and do catastrophic damage to the atmosphere by emitting harmful gasses as the items decompose. This intensifies the frustrating cycle of chasing newness, encouraging us to buy more and more often. So what can we do? Short of deleting all forms of social media and hiding in a cabin in the woods to avoid the incessant barrage of advertisements and societal influence enslaving us to trends and consumption, is there any way to break free from this cycle? Of course! As individuals, we can and should strive to shift our shopping mindset to one that will promote a more environmentally conscious closet and a stronger sense of personal style. Building sustainable clothing habits is not as hard, expensive, or innately unstylish as you think it is here’s how you can do it:
1. THRIFTING
Ironically, thrifting is itself a “trend” that became widely popular through social media. By now most teens consider thrifting an accessible way to shop more sustainably, though one with limitations that render it less convenient than shopping retail. Online thrifting, made easy through sites like ThredUp and Depop, alleviates these limitations entirely. The RealReal, too, is another great online thrifting resource that offers second-hand designer clothes at huge markdowns - these online thrift stores combine the benefits of buying secondhand with the convenience and straightforwardness of fast fashion brands. Shoppers can filter for certain sizes, styles, or other item details on these sites, making thrifting as simple and efficient as any other form of online shopping. They can also filter through brands, making it possible to shop from loved brands without contributing to their overproduction and waste. ThredUp will even calculate the consumer’s personal environmental impact throughout their ordering history. For example, I began shopping on ThredUp in June of 2021 and ThredUp shows me that I have saved 592.6 pounds of carbon dioxide emissions and 1283.4 gallons of water - saving amounts equivalent to emissions generated from 646 miles of driving and 2566.8 days of drinking water. This analysis of the consumer's “Eco Impact” motivates and empowers the sustainable shopper by showing the tangible impact they are making and also gives an important insight into the damage the fashion industry has on the environment.
Thrifting is a really great way to find fashionable and exciting clothing without excessively harming the environment. One of the biggest problems with shopping firsthand is the amount of waste generated by the companies themselves. In order to keep up with demand, fashion brands often overproduce their products, leading to a great surplus at the end of the season that they typically end up discarding to, you guessed it, earth-killing landfills. H&M, for example, released in a 2018 report that they had $4.3 billion in unsold inventory. By shopping secondhand, we are ending our support for companies that do such reckless harm to the environment and urging them to change their policies and habits in order to get customers back on board - boycotting them, in effect. Also, with the abundance of clothes already circulating, it’s a great idea to shop from this selection by shopping secondhand rather than encouraging companies to produce even more clothing. Not to mention how buying second-hand will allow you to find more unique and personal pieces of clothing and seriously help your wallet.
2. BUY BETTER
Investing in clothes that are going to make you feel comfortable and cute for a long time will have long-term benefits both for yourself and the Earth.
It’s important to consider the quality of an item before buying it. Look at the fabric it was made from- a good quality item will be made of a fabric that is best suited for its purpose. For example, athletic wear needs to be made from different materials than casual clothes
in order to function best. But fast-fashion brands often blend materials in order to make the item as cheap as possible, prioritizing low price over functionality. In general, having a large number of fabrics mixed into an item lowers its quality and indicates that it was not built with the intention of functioning best. Polyester is a fabric that is often mixed in to make an item cheaper and is a huge contributor to pollution. Synthetic polyesters are made of plastics and thus shed microplastics when they’re washed or discarded. Scientists estimate that textiles, such as polyester, are the biggest contributors to microplastic pollution in the world’s oceans.
When buying ask yourself- does this seem like it would break after a couple of wears, especially in the clasps or buttons? Does the fabric look or feel like it would pill and wear down after a couple of washes? A higher price can often be an indicator of quality because better fabrics and craftsmanship are generally more expensive. Though it may seem counterintuitive, buying higher-quality items that are more expensive will probably save you more money in the long run. You will end up taking better care of the item if you value it more, and the good quality of the item will make it last longer too, thus saving you from constantly buying new cheap clothes.
3. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF YOUR CLOTHES
Start by taking better care of your clothes. Your clothes will last longer and look better, and it will make donating them when you need to much more effective. A lot of donated clothes end up just getting trashed - thrift stores often get an abundance of clothing and can only accept ones that are in sellable shape. To ensure that your donated clothes don’t get thrown away, you should clean them before donating them and avoid donating anything you wouldn’t want to buy yourself- with those items you can make household rags or find other ways to repurpose them. You can also try selling unwanted clothes directly through resale apps like Depop and Poshmark. Another way to take advantage of clothes you already own is to style them in new ways, perhaps in ways that reflect the era’s trends. Look up styling tutorials for inspiration on how to reimagine items you already own. Being stylish isn’t necessarily about owning the most and the trendiest clothes; rather, it means styling items in versatile and creative ways to craft original and imaginative outfits. Or, if you want new clothes without buying, consider taking advantage of clothes that others already own. Swap clothes with your friends, and raid your siblings’ or your parents’ closets. Borrowing clothes can work great for trendy styles that you’re really into at the moment but don’t necessarily see yourself wearing once the trend fades. Or, if you only need an item for a certain occasion, like a school dance or costume party, consider borrowing pieces. That way you can wear a new and exciting outfit without having to see it collect dust in your closet after the event.
4. CREATE A BETTER RELATIONSHIP WITH YOUR CLOTHES
We’ve probably all fallen into the trap of buying an item because it’s trendy, or because it’s cheap or on sale, only to realize after a wear or two that we really don’t want the item. This leaves us with a huge overflowing closet, yet nothing to wear because we only half-like most of our clothes. Fashion brands purposely flood our feeds with influencers wearing their products and present sales as a limited opportunity to tap into our FOMO and get us to buy clothes we wouldn’t want or need independent of societal influence. If this happens to you a lot, consider your motives for shopping before making purchases. Ask yourself if you would still want the item in a couple of months, if it’s a piece that goes with items you already own and you can imagine yourself styling and loving it for a long time, and whether you would still want the item if you hadn’t seen influencers or friends wearing similar things. You can also try coming back to an item you want to buy after a couple of weeks to make sure you actually like the item and aren’t just buying it impulsively. Don’t let a cheap price or a good deal trick you into justifying a purchase you don’t really love or need- brands purposely make goods cheaper to make an impulse buy more justifiable. Ask yourself if you would still buy the item if it was twice as expensive, or not on sale. If you struggle to decide whether or not you really want the item or are falling victim to a trend, create a style-inspired Pinterest board to look back to when making these decisions, allowing you to further cultivate your personal style and ensure the longevity of your closet. Having a more personal relationship with your clothes will prevent you from eventually throwing away items you never truly cared about and contributing to harmful environmental drawbacks of the fashion industry.
The fashion industry is a huge environmental threat, one most of us may be scared to face. The first step to recovering from this damage is through educating ourselves and making small changes in our day-to-day consumption habits to build a more sustainable closet. It’s hard for us consumers to regulate the pollution that companies create through the rapid production of clothes, but we can make choices to consume less and buy from more sustainable options. Social media and fast-fashion marketing have turned shopping into a frenzied, impersonal experience in which we abandon our clothes the second we get an inkling that it’s not in style anymore. But fashion doesn’t have to be this way; if we are conscious of the psychological and environmental impacts that fast fashion has on us and we make an effort to be better buyers, if we fast from fast fashion, we can reassert fashion as a meaningful expression of our unique identities all while saving the Earth from the perils of overproduction and overconsumption.
Nadia Momtaz serves as the president of Environmental Club alongside Co-President Ashley Shanahan and Officers Amelia Kerr and Devin Thomas. Stay tuned for an upcoming interview about their K-Cup recycling initiative!
Sources:
- Cline, Elizabeth L. The Conscious Closet: The Revolutionary Guide to Looking Good While Doing Good. New York City, Plume, an imprint of Penguin Random House, 2019.
- Dottle, Rachael, and Jackie Gu. "The Global Glut of Clothing Is an Environmental Crisis." Bloomberg.com, Bloomberg, 23 Feb. 2022, www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2022-fashion-industry-environmental-impact/. Accessed 6 Apr. 2022.
- Image Credit: Hosey, Mike. "The Unsustainable Growth of Fast Fashion." Think Sustainability Blog, 14 Apr. 2020, thinksustainabilityblog.com/2020/04/14/the-unsustainable-growth-of-fast-fashion/. Accessed 17 May 2022.
- Monroe, Rachel. "Ultra-Fast Fashion Is Eating the World." Atlantic, vol. 327, no. 2, Mar. 2021, pp. 76–84. EBSCOhost, https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,shib&db=pwh&AN=148607124&site=eds-live.
ThredUp. "About Us." ThredUp.com, www.thredup.com/impact. Accessed 6 Apr. 2022.
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